


Knowledge Gained Through a Descent

by elfigreen14



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Victorian, Dark Period Piece AU, F/M, Murder Mystery, Scarlet Vision Exchange 2018
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-20
Updated: 2018-09-20
Packaged: 2019-07-10 23:02:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15959423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elfigreen14/pseuds/elfigreen14
Summary: Dr. Victor Shade has been called to London to help Bruce look into the death of Tony Stark. The murderer has confessed, yet there is more to the young girl sitting at the loom than what he can see in her eyes at first glance. Sometimes the only way to find the truth is to dive headfirst into the mind of a witch.





	Knowledge Gained Through a Descent

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VisionOfScarlet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VisionOfScarlet/gifts).



> Happy SVE2018 to all! This one goes out to Rosie, aka @visionofscarlet. Rosie, you're prompt for a dark period piece AU kicked my butt in the best way. This is a new kind of story for me, and I must say I've had a blast with it. It might have turned out more mystery than dark, but I hope that's okay.
> 
> Currently, this is only part 1 of a planned 2, mainly because I'm having so much fun challenging my brain and writing this that I could not leave this idea alone. Be on the look out for part 2 before the end of the month!
> 
> Inspired by Alias Grace and a bit by Penny Dreadful, which are both excellent and you all should absolutely watch - preferably not in the middle of the night while you're home alone, like I did.

“Tell me more about her.” Victor kept his eyes on the streets of London, shops and stands, ladies and beggars, whirring past the window of Dr. Banner’s carriage. It was a wonder he could make anything out in the heavy smog that hung over the city, but Victor had no problem noticing the tall factory smokestacks that were the centerpiece of this industrial revolution. It ate at his soul to see droves of men and women filing out of the factories, worn and tired, knowing they had not earned enough to feed their families for the day. Sadly, this was a concern for another day.

Bruce had met him at the harbor not an hour ago, and his friend had barely spoken a word since their hasty greeting. Victor knew, if he was to prepare for this patient, he would need to at least know why his old college friend had all but pleaded for him to come all the way from Stockholm.

Bruce turned to face the Englishman. The ever-present melancholy in Bruce’s eyes had morphed into a look of pure exhaustion, as the doctor pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes. Victor had so hoped that when Bruce moved to London three years ago, his friend’s spirits would rise – this looked to not be the case.

“Tony took her on before I arrived at the manor, so I don’t know much about her past,” Bruce told Victor. “But from the year I’ve known her, she’s been an exemplary employee. Keeps mostly to herself, but she’s never been a problem. Even now, I don’t think she’s a problem. I’m not even sure if she fully realizes what she’s done, or what’s going on. She goes about her chores like nothing’s happened. I’ve certainly never felt that I was in any danger. And I know Tony wouldn’t want something like this getting out.”

“Mr. Stark is dead,” Victor interjected. “I hardly think he’d want you harboring his murderer from the authorities. Especially after everything he’s done f-”

“Vision,” Bruce used his old nickname from their Cambridge days. This was either more serious than Victor realized, or Bruce was losing his grip. Perhaps it was both. “You know the work that Tony was doing is greater than any of us. We can’t risk compromising it by bringing _the police_ into this and having them ask too many questions. That’s why you’re here.”

Victor sighed. He knew Bruce spoke the truth, but it didn’t mean that he had to like it. He was here to examine the girl’s sanity, and he would do just that… for the sake of Tony Stark and his legacy.

**XXXXX**

Victor was directed to the drawing room upon arrival – he did not want to waste a moment in solving this mystery, if he could. He chose a seat directly in front of the fireplace, framed in a dark mahogany that seemed to be the running theme through the entirety of the house. He had expected Tony’s home to be grand and resplendent, the latest fashions of wallpaper and ornate, golden chandeliers decorating each room. Instead, Victor had been ushered into a dark manor just on the edge of town, with damask curtains drawn in every window of the house, save for this one.

“Are you to be my judge, then?”

Victor stood at the sound of a new voice entering the room. He looked over his shoulder to see a girl who couldn’t be more than twenty years old, carrying a small handbasket of yarn to a loom that was set up near the window. Her plaited hair shone a brilliant auburn in the sunlight, as she settled into the window seat behind the loom, never once taking her eyes off him. Her gaze was immediately unsettling. They had not yet been properly introduced, but she watched him as though she knew his very darkest secrets. A sly smirk lingered at the corner of her mouth.

Victor cleared his throat, breaking himself out of the observation. “Miss Maximoff. I am Dr. Victor Shade. I’m a friend of Dr. Banner.”

She scoffed at him, finally looking away to begin the task of weaving. “You say ‘Miss Maximoff’, as if I were a dainty little girl coming in for afternoon tea. Wanda will do just fine,” she admonished, already sounding very bored with him.

He nodded as he took a seat in the armchair. “Very well, Wanda.”

“So,” She sighed, not even bothering to look his way as she spoke. He was clearly not as interesting to her as the yarn in her lap. “What are _you_ going to do to me today, Doctor?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You’re not the first that Bruce has brought in to see me.” She said sharply, as if his question directly insulted her intelligence. “It’s been a month since I killed Tony, and in those four weeks I’ve seen an alchemist, a priest and a hypnotist. None have been able to get out of me what Bruce wants to hear.”

_I killed Tony._ There it was, a confession readily offered. It was too easy, Victor thought to himself. If it were that simple, and she was in fact a girl of malicious intent, Bruce would have been rid of her a month ago. There was something else at play here.

“And what is it you think Bruce wants to hear?” Victor asked her, reaching for his journal and pen.

Wanda remained silent for a moment, her focus on weaving red and black threads through her warps. “He wants me to say that I didn’t kill Tony.”

Victor watched her hands still over the loom, as if she were waging some internal war on what to say next. It was clear to him that she was experiencing some form of mental distress. The fact that she admitted to being Tony’s killer so offhandedly told Victor that she was either lying or suffering from a sort of dissociative psychopathy. 

“Well, to answer your question, Wanda,” he said softly, “I am just here to listen. I am what’s known as a _psychologist_. I will ask you questions, listen to your answers, and determine whether I believe you truly are a murderer, or just a confused young woman.”

Wanda stared at him, utterly stunned by his honesty.

“And if I may give my preliminary finding,” he continued, “I don’t believe you to be the kind of woman who would kill someone in cold blood.”

Wholly without malice, she replied. “But you’ve only just met me.”

“As I said, a preliminary finding.”

She worked to hold back a smile, but Victor could see it creeping up the corner of her mouth. The first step in getting the truth from her would be to be truthful in turn. And Victor had to admit, it was rather nice to see her smile. The light in the room seemed to draw in a halo around her face. She turned back to the loom, the thread in her hand beginning to wind again.

“Well then, Dr. Shade. What is it you’d like to know?”

**XXXXX**

And so it went, for the next several days – he asked her questions, and, for the most part, it seemed she answered truthfully.

Victor learned that Wanda had grown up in Sokovia. Her mother passed away when she was nine. She had wandered through Eastern Europe, finding shelter with a Romani caravan, attempting to track down her father while scraping by as a pickpocket.

“A very good pickpocket, mind you.” She said on their second afternoon together in the drawing room. “Never got caught.” She looked up from her weaving, waiting for Victor to finish his writing and face her.

 When he turned to meet her gaze, he felt the air grow heavy as she spoke again. It was as if he could see the cogs in her mind turning and working to say something that would throw him off kilter. He felt a soft brush of something against his mind, a presence, as if it was searching, searching, searching for just the right thing.

“I’ve been told I’m very good with my hands.”

Victor couldn’t explain it. He’d felt several moments just like this during his first day of observing Wanda. As if there were something lurking just underneath – an unspoken comment, a charged glance across the room. At times, he could feel her watching him as he scribbled his notes. It felt like he suddenly became in tune with every frequency in the room when she directed her gaze at him. It was a feeling that was both disconcerting and strangely thrilling. Victor found himself anticipating that moment each day.

On his sixth day at Stark Manor, he arrived at the drawing room before Wanda, as he usually did. She was still employed in the house and only met him for a few hours each day, as she wove away at her tapestry. Today, Victor approached the loom to take a closer look at her creation. He was vaguely aware that tapestries and quilts were used to tell stories, either of tales long ago or of their own creator. Perhaps this work in progress could tell him something about his patient, something that she might not willingly divulge.

At the bottom of the loom were weaved three parallel lines, all traveling upward – a brilliant blue on the left and a bright red on the right. In the center between the two was a line of intertwined grey and black. They continued upward along the loom for about a foot in length, until the center line abruptly stopped and the red and blue lines converged above the black and grey, into a circle in the center.

Just above the circle, there was a pattern of alternating lines. The blue line had now been threaded along with the grey, and they formed sharp zigzags across the width of the tapestry. Alternating with that pattern were red and black, curvy whorls. The colors and shapes should not have worked together, but somehow there was a harmony to them, as they balanced each other across the loom.

After a few repetitions of the blue zigzags and red whorls, however, Victor noticed the blue pattern stopped all together, and the red and black whorls became erratic and inconsistent, until the two colors were woven across the entire tapestry, covering every inch of it. Here and there, though, he could see small bursts of sky blue scattered throughout the sea of scarlet and obsidian.

It was still unfinished, but from what he could tell, it was not a happy story.

“Do you like it?”

Her voice was quiet, yet in no way lacking command. It made him feel as if he were back in school and had been caught doing something naughty. Victor turned and realized just how close Wanda actually was. He was caught up in the fragrance around her –  a mix of the firewood she had just replenished and the lavender that scented the laundry she tended to. Her red hair had escaped its usual plait and fell in soft waves over her shoulders. It caught the light from the window, creating a crown of fire around her head. Victor thought she might be the most ethereally beautiful sight he’d ever seen.

He was beginning to wonder if there might not be something magical about Wanda Maximoff.

“Yes, erm –” he cleared his thoughts, stepping back to create what he felt was a necessary distance between them. “I think it’s a family. Yours?”

Wanda nodded, dragging her fingers over the grey and black line at the bottom. “It was always the three of us, until Mama died. Then Pietro and I became truly inseparable.”

“Pietro?”

She did not turn back to Victor, her fingers now moving to trace the red and blue circle. “My brother. _Twin_ , actually.”

Ah, so the tapestry _was_ divulging knowledge. “I’m sorry. I was not aware you had a twin brother.”

Wanda laughed humorlessly, her eyes now looking through the window to the grounds outside. “You wouldn’t. No one in this house speaks of him now – not since he died doing Tony Stark’s bidding.”

By this, Victor was truly taken aback. “I am so sorry, Wanda.” He reached out to take her hand, to offer comfort, but, to his surprise, it was she who touched him first.

“It doesn’t matter,” she announced. The fingers that had lovingly touched the woven life before them now wrapped around his wrist. “I don’t want to talk here today. Walk with me?”

She led Victor through the back of the house, past the study, into the kitchens, and out the door to the garden. He thought she would stop there, but Wanda pushed forward, and he now saw that the forest behind the manor was her destination. Here, she released his hand to navigate her plain cotton skirts around the thick brush and roots, and Victor found himself missing her touch instantly.

“Wanda?” he called to her, after a few minutes of trekking. She had taken the lead, a few steps ahead of him, but immediately turned at the sound of his wavering voice. There was less light shining through the branches this deep into the forest, but Victor could swear he saw the same radiance emanating from around her, as if they were still in the drawing room, the sun beaming behind her and illuminating her spirit.

“Yes?” she replied, chuckling to herself as Victor sidestepped bushes and roots to catch up to her.

“I am curious,” he started, cautiously, “as to why you hadn’t mentioned your brother before. After all, siblings usually share the strongest of familial bonds, and from what I’ve read, twins can form-”

“You don’t have any brothers or sisters, do you, Dr. Shade?” she interrupted, crossing her arms and leaning against a large, black poplar tree behind her. Wanda found it quite endearing when he began to ramble on like that. His brow would furrow in concentration, but she had a feeling this was something he had no experience in personally.

Victor lowered his head, trying to hide a repentant smile, before responding. “You’re quite right, Wanda. Now that I think about it, it seems rather unfair that I should ask about every little detail in your life while you know so little about mine.” He extended his hand to her, as he had failed to do upon their first meeting. He did not bow to her and expect a stupid, ladylike curtsy in return. He presented himself as an equal to her – an act of which she had precious little experience in receiving. She took his hand with a sure and steady grip, and he met her with matching enthusiasm.

“Victor Shade, Cambridge Class of 1868. Born in the year unknown, raised in the Ultron Home for Boys, where I quickly gained favor with Lord Ultron. He had no children of his own but wanted an apprentice to help run his workhouses as he approached old age.”

Wanda listened silently and watched as Victor’s eyes glazed over with the sadness of years past. Victor saw her warping look of pity but shook it off with a somber smile.

“I had no interest in continuing the man’s legacy, but I took advantage of the education he offered. Once I had entered university, I was able to expose the horrid conditions of the house and the vile treatment of its children. That’s how I met Mr. Stark and Dr. Banner. They helped me in gathering the evidence needed to close the Ultron Home for good. It’s a small thing, but I like to think it’s saved some child the anguish of wasting away in a sweatshop.”

They were both silent for a moment, allowing Victor’s past to float away with the rustling, dry autumn leaves. Wanda then reached for his hand, holding it tightly in reassurance.

“It’s not a small thing,” she told him.

Victor suddenly felt he was seeing the true spirit of Wanda for the first time. She was warm and understanding, scared and alone. She embraced her independence but longed for the company of her family again. She was small and meek yet held a true power inside those golden, amber eyes. She was a glowing afternoon with the promise of a raging storm not far behind.

And _her hands_. God, her hands. The hands that wove magic into her tapestry, that wove truth into every single stitch of fabric. The hands that reached out to him now to offer solace and compassion.

Victor cradled her hand in both of his, bringing it to his mouth and laying a gentle kiss on each finger. His eyes had drifted shut, but he felt Wanda’s hand twist in his grasp, her warm palm landing on his smooth, cold cheek.

Long ago, Tony had teased him for it. His body somehow always ran cold, and Tony would call him a machine, an automaton, incapable of a hot rush of emotion. It didn’t help that Victor had never ventured to make any sort of attempt at a romantic relationship. He was dedicated, at the time, to his studies, eager to make a change in the lives of all the boys he had left behind at Ultron’s.

Now, the only thing that seemed worth studying was the contradictory woman in front of him. Victor ran his fingers through her hair, a soft inferno of blazing red and copper waves that were reflected in the gold hue of her eyes. He tried his luck, skimming his knuckles gently down her cheek. Her eyes mimicked his reaction from before, eyelashes fluttering together as she shivered under his touch. Victor quickly removed his hand, worried that he had frightened her.

But Wanda’s fingers reached for his once again, now placing both his hands on her cheeks.

“Don’t,” she whispered to him, her rosy lips a breath away from his. “Don’t leave.”

It was as if her words were a spell, pulling him in like a magnet to the precious metal in front of him. And in the moment their lips met, a charge of electricity sent every neuron in his brain into chaos.

Wanda’s hands had moved from clutching the fabric of his shirt to winding their way around his shoulders, leaving a trail of tingling skin in their wake. The more of him that she explored, the more he wanted to be rid of the inconvenient clothing creating a barrier to the full force of her touch. Her hands around his neck, Wanda pulled Victor flush against her, and he braced himself against the tree behind her. Her kisses were rushed and languid at the same time, tasting every inch of his lips. Somewhere in his mind, Victor thought about propriety and considered breaking their embrace.

Then Wanda traced her tongue along his bottom lip, and all hope was lost to him.

As they met each other with open mouths and entangled tongues, Victor eagerly traced his hands down her chest and to her waist, pulling her against him, needing her warmth wherever he could find it.

She suddenly took hold of his shoulders, and, with a physical strength and speed he didn’t know she possessed, Wanda shoved him away from her as she cried, “Don’t!”

Victor began to feel shame and disgrace, ready to apologize for every single glance and touch, when he looked into Wanda’s eyes. They were not the warm, amber eyes he knew. Instead, what glared back at him were the chilling, blue irises of a stranger, a distasteful scowl underneath to match.

“Don’t touch her.” The voice that came from Wanda was not hers, either. And just as quickly as they appeared, the cold eyes dissolved into the scared and lonely ones he met nearly a week ago. Wanda’s face crumpled into a sob, her hands covering her face in distress.

“Victor, I’m sorry,” she said, her voice faltering and unsteady. She risked a peek at him, mouth agape and not quite understanding what he had seen. For all his scholarly learning, it didn’t take much to render Victor Shade silent and confused.

“Wanda, _I’m_ sorry,” he replied carefully, emphasizing he was the one at fault. He took a step back towards her. “Please accept-”

“No, stop!” She countered his step, keeping the distance between them. “Please, just…I’m sorry.” She ran past him, back to the house, leaving him to wonder what exactly had just occurred.

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thank you to Jordan for being a perfect beta!
> 
> Review/kudos if you liked it?


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